Author Topic: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.  (Read 5425 times)

Offline Yuillegan

  • White Council
  • Posty McPostington
  • *****
  • Posts: 1384
  • Forum Moderator
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #15 on: April 23, 2023, 11:04:35 PM »
Plus, the blessed kerchiefs the Knights wrap dropped coins do in seem to be able to block the summoning. And that's just a portable field measure to secure them for transport, so it stands to reason that their coin jail monasteries have better countermeasures.  On the other hand, it's also possible they're mistaken about it being the kerchiefs (they do get a fair bit wrong about the Lash situation) and it's actually the presence of the Knights themselves, or near-saintly priests like Forthill, who are jamming the summoning like they jam Anduriel's listening.  Rotate the wrong dude out of the monastery, and the merely averagely-good personnel no longer pose a problem to Nic and Tessa rubber-banding their crews back to them?

As for the Kim theory, she doesn't necessarily have to have a particular affinity for the dark. Kumori seemed more like a deluded idealist, with a side order of healthy fear of how easily Cowl could kill her if she accepted Harry's suggestion to turn on him.  Telling her that he could reverse her necromantic resurrection - or convert her into a regular controlled zombie if she got out of line - would be a pretty effective stick alongside the carrot of learning to use dark power for her own morally good (at least, self-proclaimedly so) actions.

The main drawback I see to it is that the kind of necromantic resurrection she demonstrated with the critically injured gangster in Dead Beat seems to require the deceased to be pretty fresh. Death being a process rather than a binary, it seems like necro-healing can only catch them up to a certain level of how far gone they are.  So if Cowl had snapped her up as an apprentice acquisition of opportunity after MacFinn killed her, the window of opportunity is almost certainly before she made it to burial. And while I'm sure he could do that easily in and of itself, it would leave a missing body where the official system is expecting one to be accounted for. Given Karrin's interest in her, that seems like the sort of thing it would be a stretch for her not to notice and end up questioning Harry over.  Not impossible if he was using mind magic really widely to cover his tracks, but still a pretty big stretch.

I will give credit that most of the Kumori theories have been blind to the possibility of Cowl bringing back a dead character, though. That bears considering.
Part of the danger of Anduriel is apart from the Angels themselves, I doubt many beings know the full extent of his powers. Perhaps not even most angels necessarily (he wouldn't be much of a spy master if he couldn't spy on his own kind). So it wouldn't surprise me to learn the Church is unaware of certain loopholes. Not to mention I suspect the Church is riddled with misinformation (and indeed, disinformation perhaps from Denarians etc).

Kim just doesn't seem like the type to touch dark magic. By connection, I mean she had no link to the bad guys. No sob story to make her turn dark. Apart from being murdered, I suppose.

Kumori, as you point out, seems deluded. Maybe even magically so (enthrallment comes to mind).

I agree, the longer the being is dead the harder it is (particularly if it is human). Probably to do with things like souls having their final resting place etc. But I wonder if there is a hard limit for how long a person can be dead for. I suspect not, but it might just require special circumstances etc.

In any case, why would Cowl expend such resources on a throwaway hedge witch? She was no solid power herself. All to upset Harry? That would say Cowl has a personal interest in hurting Harry, and yet supposedly the two are unconnected. If Cowl personally wants to hurt Harry it would suggest he and Harry have history, which makes other theories far more likely.
Hi, I'm a moderator. We're here to help. Please remain calm. Don't go outdoors.

Offline Conspiracy Theorist

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 2981
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #16 on: April 24, 2023, 12:01:47 AM »
Kumori was interested in Necromancy because she thought it could heal death, this is another point for Sarissa, as a Changeling who had not made her choice she was essentially as long-lived as her Fae twin sister Maeve, but without the inherent power of he Fae Heritage (but not her human heritage, Mab was a wizard first) she therefore saw mortal friends, lovers, family, etc die through accident, old age etc time after time, and though someone connected with Kemmler could help her find a solution. What she really needed was to talk to Michael Carpenter, or Father Forthill. She was therefore deluded, she meant well and Cowl/Nameless played on that to gain a hold over Mab’s daughter and spare to Maeve.

Offline Snark Knight

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 3933
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #17 on: April 24, 2023, 12:32:12 AM »
Kumori was interested in Necromancy because she thought it could heal death, this is another point for Sarissa

I don't discount the possibility, but I'm not convinced it's the only one, either.

For one, if we're open to Kumori being someone Cowl revived by necromancy ... what about Aurora?  Interest in healing, check. Delusional and already connected to Nemesis, check and check.  Would cause Harry pain to face again, check. And there have been a relatively limited number of antagonists who tried to convince Harry to go along with their plans or stand aside because they believe they're doing the right thing, rather than threaten or bribe him off a case - Kumori and Aurora were two of those.

Not sure I actually believe that theory, but she does tick a lot of boxes.

Offline Conspiracy Theorist

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 2981
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #18 on: April 24, 2023, 07:19:11 PM »
Raising the dead tends to generate a lot of psychic noise,  not saying Cowl wouldn’t do it, but he would hide it amongst a lot of other necromancy like during Dead Beat or Battle Ground, he was very busy during Dead Beat so I would think he might have tried raising someone during Drakuls little shindig.

Maybe he brought back Kemmler….

Maybe he did it before….

Offline Melriken

  • Conversationalist
  • **
  • Posts: 112
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #19 on: April 24, 2023, 07:53:08 PM »
Raising the dead tends to generate a lot of psychic noise,  not saying Cowl wouldn’t do it, but he would hide it amongst a lot of other necromancy like during Dead Beat or Battle Ground, he was very busy during Dead Beat so I would think he might have tried raising someone during Drakuls little shindig.

Maybe he brought back Kemmler….

Maybe he did it before….
I like the thoughts, but I think Kemmler is outside the limits...

I would expect you could Raise anyone in Chicago beyond (like papa Murphy) but not anyone who has passed on from there.  And my guess is that the power required is proportional to the distance between the body you are Raising and the Spirit you are putting into it and the difference between the two...

It is much easier to raise the dead as they are dying then if you wait, and the longer you wait the harder it gets... if you don't actually have the body you want to raise you can still do it, but need a replacement body (Corpse Taker style) but the closer that body is to the soul you are stuffing into it the easier.  But at some point you can't raise someone because they moved on, and that period varies by person (Lots of people who died more recently than Papa Murph passed on, but you could still go get him).

Then again the afterlife isn't clear in Dresden Files... Harry was a walking Soul in GS, but everyone thought he was a ghost, and everyone thinks ghosts are echos not souls... so how wrong is everyone?  Are ANY ghosts Echos or are they all really souls like Harry? Are some one and some the other? Is sanity the difference? IE a ghost is an echo, but a soul can use it like a body and ghost insanity is what happens when a soul loses it's hold on the echo.

If you can find a ghost can you give it a body with necromancy? is there a practical difference between that and raising the dead?

I do agree with the thought that at least one of the times Kemmler came back it was with help... but would Cowl be one to do it? He doesn't seem to really like Kemmler in DB.

Offline g33k

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 2367
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #20 on: April 24, 2023, 08:53:40 PM »
  Plus, the blessed kerchiefs the Knights wrap dropped coins do in seem to be able to block the summoning. And that's just a portable field measure to secure them for transport, so it stands to reason that their coin jail monasteries have better countermeasures.  On the other hand, it's also possible they're mistaken about it being the kerchiefs (they do get a fair bit wrong about the Lash situation) and it's actually the presence of the Knights themselves, or near-saintly priests like Forthill, who are jamming the summoning like they jam Anduriel's listening.  Rotate the wrong dude out of the monastery, and the merely averagely-good personnel no longer pose a problem to Nic and Tessa rubber-banding their crews back to them? 

I present to you a hypothesis:

The Holy Hankies (and the Penalty Boxes maintained by the Church, and everything else they do to keep the Denarii of Darkness out of circulation) don't do anything at all to block the Denarians or summoning a Coin.

There's enough infighting amongst the Denarians, that they could very well be willing to leave an "uncooperative" Fallen to languish for a decade, or a century.  Similarly, some of the more-picky of the Fallen may want a really well-qualified host, before they bother pursuing an agenda.

The Fallen find it useful to have the Church spend all this time & energy on "collecting" and "protecting" the Coins, which could be better-spend (by the Church's lights) on something effective.  So they cultivate this delusion amongst their foes within the Church.

When they don't have anything better to do, they "stir the ants' nest" by summoning more Coins, more often... "Oh noes!  We haz a traitor amongst us!"  & yet more time/energy wasted, distrust sown, as they try to track down a "traitor" and implement new/better security measures.
« Last Edit: April 24, 2023, 08:58:33 PM by g33k »

Offline Conspiracy Theorist

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 2981
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #21 on: April 24, 2023, 09:08:35 PM »
We really need to see Nicky take out a purloined holy hankie and blow his nose into it noisily in front of the Knights.

Offline Melriken

  • Conversationalist
  • **
  • Posts: 112
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #22 on: April 24, 2023, 09:23:03 PM »
We really need to see Nicky take out a purloined holy hankie and blow his nose into it noisily in front of the Knights.
Yes please.

This sounds like something he would do, even if he had to have a fake one made (because a fake one would help confuse the issue).

Offline Mira

  • Needs A Life
  • ***
  • Posts: 24351
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #23 on: April 25, 2023, 02:47:41 PM »


  Actually I think the holy hankies do work.. If the example of Harry and Lasciel holds true, the only reason Harry would have been able to summon her is the fact that her shadow was in his head. Also not until Lash sacrificed herself, and he thought he still heard her voice afterwards did he once and for all reject the coin.  Before that he never accepted nor rejected her coin, he thought he was protected because he had buried it and put a magic circle around it.  Yet her shadow managed to get in her head and up to the moment of her sacrifice she was still trying to get Harry to accept the coin.  In Death Masks, the coins are picked up with the holy hankies mainly to prevent inadvertent contact with them, which could lead to the one picking up the coin getting a shadow of the holder in his or her head, which usually leads to acceptance of the coin.  When the coin is picked up with the hanky it is because the coin has been rejected by the holder or the holder is dead, so no connection with a would be host.. Since the hanky prevents the contact, it is effective.

Offline The_Sibelis

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 1036
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #24 on: April 25, 2023, 04:09:53 PM »
Quote
My theory is that this imbalance created by free use of Angelic power is balanced out by returning more power from the Fallen to the mortal world. So mortals choose to employ Angelic power outside the balance, and "coincidence" causes a balancing Fallen force to be expressed, freeing a coin. It would be wonderfully ironic that by being the people they are, the Knights are perpetuating the struggle
pretty much think the same thing. They balance each other out on a ten to one scale. Part of the reason, is they aren't actually the mirror opposite of them, they simply take up that space. Balance within reality seems of paramount importance because imbalances tend to lend that weight to something not part of reality. Hence the perfect balance between the fae. Although, consider. Angelic beings cannot interfere without someone doing something already. The perfect balance to that is beings whose sole purpose is to DO those things. Starts to get a bit of the chicken vs egg parabol.

Offline Conspiracy Theorist

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 2981
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #25 on: April 25, 2023, 04:11:34 PM »
Yes please.

This sounds like something he would do, even if he had to have a fake one made (because a fake one would help confuse the issue).
He would spend the time and effort to get a real one.

Offline Melriken

  • Conversationalist
  • **
  • Posts: 112
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #26 on: April 25, 2023, 04:34:19 PM »
He would spend the time and effort to get a real one.
He would... unless he couldn't (because he couldn't touch a real one or a real one would pull the coin out of him etc) in which case he would get a fake one to make the church think the real ones don't do what they do. :)

Offline Conspiracy Theorist

  • Posty McPostington
  • ***
  • Posts: 2981
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #27 on: April 26, 2023, 07:42:38 PM »
Nicky would make sure he had a certificate of authenticity signed by the Pope, and a photograph of the Pope handing it to him.

Remember he was quite happy to handle both the fake shroud and the Grail.

Offline Ed0517

  • Conversationalist
  • **
  • Posts: 610
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #28 on: May 04, 2023, 09:14:56 AM »
Nicky would make sure he had a certificate of authenticity signed by the Pope, and a photograph of the Pope handing it to him.

Remember he was quite happy to handle both the fake shroud and the Grail.

Neither of which would have had any reason to be specifically blessed against him. Recall the Grail predates the Denarians - not the Fallen themselves, but the pieces of silver. the Shroud is not a weapon, why would it be against the Fallen in any way? the Hankies are to contain them, it is the Holy Hanky purpose. And even the shroud may predate Denarians - in three days it had been empowered and cast off. Did they pick up and charge the denarii that quickly?

Offline vincentric

  • Conversationalist
  • **
  • Posts: 581
    • View Profile
Re: Some personal theories I want to get feedback on.
« Reply #29 on: May 04, 2023, 01:47:53 PM »
It's possible that the Denarii were inhabited as Judas discarded them, so they predate the all the relics except the Grail.

That does mean that the Swords were made soon after and used before they acquired their more famous names.